The mouth of the Chickatachee River

I kicked off my ACW campaign game today with an amphibious assault on the mouth of the Chickatachee River. Fort Chiccanchee sits on a bluff overlooking and dominating the river on it's left bank. On the right bank a couple of redoubts have been built to house some artillery. Alongside the big guns, there is a battalion of Confenderate infantry on either bank.

The Union assault would be led by two Ironclads - the USS Humphrey and USS Hunter, to be followed up by two timberclads carrying the assault troops. The plan was to suppress Fort Chiccanchee before landing two battalions to take it by storm. Once the left bank was secure, the boats would concentrate on the right bank and land the last two battalions. If things didn't go well on the left bank, a extra two battalions would be used to reinforce the assault on the fort.

The first two Ironclads steam into the river mouth. Fort Chiccanchee sits on the right in this photo (left bank).

Fort Chiccanchee, consisting of heavy emplaced gun, mortar and a defensive redoubt with defensive artillery.

The view from the river just before the bombardment commences.

The big guns fire

In it's first shot the USS Humphrey manages to take out the big gun. 

And next thing the USS Hunter destroys the artillery in the redoubt. This is looking too easy!

The heavy battery on the right bank scores a hit on the USS Humphrey, which reduces her speed.

The timberclads arrive.

The naval landing troops and 18th Ohio landed.

Clibing the slopes towards Chiccanchee. The South Carolina battalion can't stop them.

USS Humphrey lands another lucky hit on the last heavy artillery redoubt.

USS Hunger has taken a few hits that have knocked out some guns, but it still manages to land a battalion on the right bank.

The assault goes in on Fort Chiccanchee

The Right bank landing is getting into some trouble

The Ohio enter the fort from the rear and flank the South Carolinians...

... who can't hold on and rout!

The Confederate mortar is put out of action and the stars and stripes flies over fort Chiccanchee!

But things are going very badly on the right bank. 

The remnants of the landing party withdraw. 

So a mixed result. The primary objective, Fort Chiccanchee was taken and the left bank of the river mouth secured, but the Confederates still have control of the right bank. This means that the campaign in the Chickatachee valley will be without riverboat support, at least until another assault landing can be attempted.

I married the Featherstone-style ACW rules with a simple set of Ironclad rules written by Andy Callan and available for free on the net. They worked well, but I had to reduce the armour values of the ironclads mid game, otherwise it was taking way too long to do any damage. I also realised that none of my Featherstone style rules have any modifier for being outnumbered in melee, so I need to go and change that.

Nate